The PATHMASTER products are part of an adventure writing and design competition from Adventureaweek.com. Five finalists from loads of initial entries were chosen to write an adventure each, and the winning adventure of the five gets to move onward and upward in the RPG writing industry. This review is a review of one of the adventures from the five finalists. I've reviewed each of the five final adventure submissions, culminating in me choosing my own personal winning entry for PATHMASTER. Each review has been concluded with a few comments on the adventure relative to the others, and some justification as to its position in the winning stakes. All five reviews have been posted at the same time, so if you're reading this, you can read the other 4 review entries as well. With that in mind, on with the review.

The Timeless Fort is a 51 page Pathfinder RPG adventure written by Luis Loza for 3rd level characters. The product presentation is neat and professional, with excellent maps, art and use of colour-coded layout to allow GMs to quickly find what they need. The product has a rather heavy background on each page and for the text boxes, so won't be suitable for all when it comes to printing. Writing is good, with good attention to detail, and good descriptive text that allows the imagination to run wild.

The Timeless Fort takes elements of the film 'Groundhog Day' and combines that into a compelling story with a hint of time-travelling madness. An ancient fort, host to a powerful artifact, is stuck in a time-loop, and the PCs, upon entering the fort, are cast into a world of kings and foes battling for control of the power of the artifact. The PCs are required to protect the fort as much as they can, while at the same time unraveling the mysteries of the time loop and so bringing an end to an ancient tale. While doing so, they are capable of being 'reset' in the time loop experiencing the same events again, as they struggle to make sense of events around them. The adventure is entirely location based in the fort, though the action, barring initial exploration, is largely event based with the PCs responding to swarms of events happening around them and the soldiers of the fort.

This is an exciting and dynamic adventure that will see the PCs rushed off their feet as they dash from one place to the next, facing foes from all sides while trying to deal with a potentially unreal situation and the many soldiers of the fort. It's a fast-paced action adventure, which looks like it will be a blast to run. While the time-travelling aspects might not be for everyone, I think these can (and probably should if I were to play it) be glossed over. I think incorporating the time-travelling is an interesting idea, but I think the execution was a little unclear in places, as to what consequences there were between time loops. I'm not sure players will really enjoy going through the motions to repeat something they've done before. For me, this adventure just doesn't need the time-travelling - it's a distraction to an otherwise strong adventure that is just fine on its own.

There are several things I love about this adventure. Firstly, there are a lot of factions involved, meaning the action is varied, and you're not bashing heads against the same old creatures all the time. Motivations for the factions are different, and it means that one moment you could be facing one monster crawling up from underground, and the next another monster trying to breach the fort walls. This makes it interesting both for the DM and the players. Secondly, there are a lot of things happening and a lot of events to play with. These make the action dynamic and fast, and similar events can easily be incorporated to change or add to the adventure. All the little parts of the adventure make for interesting scenes. I really liked the fact that several events could happen at once, and that while the PCs were dealing with one, other events could take place in their absence.

This is an excellent adventure that's full of action and fun. The encounters are interesting and action-packed, the story is good, and the event-driven nature means that the PCs will feel themselves being rushed as things happen fast and quick even when they're not around. While it's not an 'against all odds' kind of scenario, it can create a sense of panic as the PCs deal with too many things happening at once, and need to decide how to handle and best deal with the situations. Compelling narrative, great action, excellent dynamics, and a lot of fun. Excellent adventure.

As mentioned in my other reviews, Timeless Fort and Ironwall Gap Must Hold are very similar style adventures. Both are dynamic and action packed, with events happening around them, although I think the air of the mystical and the pace of the events in Timeless Fort is better. I really liked the pacing and number/type of events of Timeless Fort compared to Ironwall Gap Must Hold, but at the same time the time-travelling is a bit of a distraction. While To Walk the Dark Road has oodles of atmosphere, the dynamic and frantic action of Timeless Fort still give the adventure a unique feel. Cutting Silver Pass is really slow on the action front compared to Timeless Fort, while the more 'standard' adventure in Twilight Falling, while it comes with a good mix of atmosphere and action, doesn't quite match this on the excitement front. In the end, for me, it was a toss-up between Ironwall Gap Must Hold and Timeless Fort, and despite my feelings on time-travelling as a distraction, I think Timeless Fort wins out by a smidgen. I've rated this adventure as 1st in my list of adventures for the PATHMASTER contest.

The PATHMASTER products are part of an adventure writing and design competition from Adventureaweek.com. Five finalists from loads of initial entries were chosen to write an adventure each, and the winning adventure of the five gets to move onward and upward in the RPG writing industry. This review is a review of one of the adventures from the five finalists. I've reviewed each of the five final adventure submissions, culminating in me choosing my own personal winning entry for PATHMASTER. Each review has been concluded with a few comments on the adventure relative to the others, and some justification as to its position in the winning stakes. All five reviews have been posted at the same time, so if you're reading this, you can read the other 4 review entries as well. With that in mind, on with the review.

Ironwall Gap Must Hold is a 40 page pdf Pathfinder adventure, written by Jacob Michaels, for 7th level characters. The pdf is very neatly presented, much like the others in the series, with good art, maps and layout, the latter in particular helping to find things in the module through colour-coding. Like other products in the series, this is not a printer-friendly product, so not something one would want to print at home. Writing is good, and the overall presentation is coherent and guides one well through the adventure and the suggested course of action. I've a big fan of adventures that contain clear descriptions of the adventure through a detailed overview, and this product does not disappoint there.

Ironwall Gap Must Hold is a location-based adventure that takes place in an isolated border fort. The PCs stumble upon the action right from the start, and soon find themselves defending a large fort and its garrison of soldiers from an invading orc army. This is an event-based adventure, where certain events happen periodically throughout the adventure, but for the most part the PCs are left to their own devices in how they spend their time (presumably by improving defenses or fortifying the fort). I really like this format of adventure, as it allows PCs to strongly affect the outcome of things directly through their own actions. It also allows room for lots of creativity, and the adventure fort has enough of interest in it that players can really get stuck into how to make the best use of the available resources. This adventure will likely suit pro-active players more, as they'll need to plan and prepare if they want to hold off an orc army that outnumbers them substantially.

The action is fairly fast-paced, and the PCs will need to deal both with assaults from inside the fort and those from outside the fort. On the latter front the events allow for different types of challenges, ensuring that each event isn't just rinse, lather and repeat. There's a lot happening inside the fort, so PCs get a chance to explore while at the same time dealing with attacks and handling the garrison. The adventure uses the mass combat rules for Pathfinder, and familiarity with this will help a lot in making things run smoother. I enjoyed the way in which the battles were put together, and how the PCs can affect the outcome of events based on actions before the event.

Overall, this adventure has a lot going for it. Fast-paced action, interesting story, room for discovery, roleplaying and creativity, and some epic battles. This is really adventure that's well written and well constructed, and one that will appeal to many who enjoy seeing PCs use creativity and planning to get themselves out of a sticky situation. Excellent adventure.

With regard to the other adventures, this one has more in common with Timeless Fort that the other three. Where I think Timeless Fort does better is in the nature of the events and the types of action that take place, and to a certain extent with the number of factions that it introduces. Facing one large orc army with a smaller number of large events isn't quite the same as facing multiple factions that are encountered through numerous small events. In a perfect world, I'd have probably picked some of the material from Timeless Fort to dump into this adventure or the other way around, as it makes the action a bit more varying and interesting. It's a different kind of adventure to the other three, but I like the dynamics involved here, and the scope for players to be creative and make something interesting happen. It's not as linear as the other adventures in terms of PCs' actions. I do think that the flavour and atmosphere of the other three, in particular To Walk the Dark Road, would do wonders to add an elements of magic and the mystical, which is not something this adventure excels at. Overall, it was really a toss-up between Timeless Fort and Ironwall Gap Must Hold for my 1st place, and I think Ironwall Gap Must Hold just doesn't quite make it. I've rated this adventure 2nd in my list of adventures for the PATHMASTER contest.

The PATHMASTER products are part of an adventure writing and design competition from Adventureaweek.com. Five finalists from loads of initial entries were chosen to write an adventure each, and the winning adventure of the five gets to move onward and upward in the RPG writing industry. This review is a review of one of the adventures from the five finalists. I've reviewed each of the five final adventure submissions, culminating in me choosing my own personal winning entry for PATHMASTER. Each review has been concluded with a few comments on the adventure relative to the others, and some justification as to its position in the winning stakes. All five reviews have been posted at the same time, so if you're reading this, you can read the other 4 review entries as well. With that in mind, on with the review.

To Walk the Dark Road is a 41 page pdf Pathfinder RPG adventure for characters of level 7. The adventure is written by Michael Allen. Layout and presentation are very good, with excellent artwork and clear and legible maps. The pdf has quite dark backgrounds for pages and text boxes, so this is most definitely not a printer friendly product. One or two editing errors slipped through, but for the most part it's excellently written, with clear descriptions, vivid details and lots of atmospheric writing. One part of the layout I particularly like, is the attention to detail on what constitutes a combat encounter, some explanatory text, or read-aloud text. These are all colour-coded, and allow one to quickly find the details of what you're looking for without having to search intensely for it.

The adventure takes place in the Lost Lands, a barren and hostile land cursed by the gods and roaming with dark and dangerous creatures. The atmosphere is definitely one of horror, and in places it can be quite creepy. Just getting through the adventure start where a certain artifact needs to be attached to one of the PCs' bodies is quite horrific. The adventure maintains this theme throughout, with horror, fear, gore and misdirection playing parts of this adventure. As a whole these elements combine together nicely to create an adventure with excellent atmosphere, where the PCs will constantly feel like the world around them is watching them. It's definitely not an adventure for the faint-hearted, and certainly not one for younger audiences.

The PCs are tasked with uncovering the mystery behind an ancient druidic conclave that once controlled a great treasure. The PCs must wander into the Lost Lands, travel the road once built by an ancient army that came before them, and eventually reach the island where the fruits of their journey will be plucked. Along the way they must uncover more clues to guide them on the path, fight creatures most foul, deal with the environment and its challenges, and constantly face a cursed land where nothing is safe, not even sleep. A number of plot hooks are provided should the DM need them to get the PCs started.

Encounters in To Walk the Dark Road are very well detailed and exciting. I liked the varying nature of the encounters, and the fact that some of them take place over the entire length of the adventure. While parts of this can feel like just another encounter on the road, I think the background and encounters work together to form a coherent whole where the journey has a sense of purpose and mystery. This makes each encounter more than a wandering encounter, but rather something that must be solved for the remainder of the adventure to make sense. I certainly enjoyed the structure of the game, the choice of challenges and the atmosphere that the adventure creates. The ending is fairly satisfying as well.

Overall, this is a good adventure, with elements of fear and horror that play out excellently throughout the adventure. Challenges are appropriately set, different and exciting, and I really enjoyed the role that terrain and environment play in the encounters but also the theme of the adventure as a whole. Very good adventure.

As far as to how this adventure compares to the other adventures, it's certainly the one that has the most atmosphere and is designed to play a bit like a horror movie. Therein lies its strengths, something which the other adventures aren't that strong in. However, while it has lots of atmosphere, and good encounters, it's not that dynamic. The Timeless Fort and Ironwall Gap Must Hold are far more dynamic adventures, and ones where the actions and decisions of the PCs are more important. It's better than Twilight Falling in terms of its atmosphere, and offers a different style of adventure to the fairly standard fare of Twilight Falling. Lastly, Cutting Silver Pass is such a different adventure that it's hard to compare the two. I still think the atmosphere, sense of purpose, environment and exciting encounters allow it to win out over Cutting Silver Pass, which is a bit hit and miss in places. At the end of the line, I've rated this adventure 3rd in my list of adventures in the PATHMASTER contest.

The PATHMASTER products are part of an adventure writing and design competition from Adventureaweek.com. Five finalists from loads of initial entries were chosen to write an adventure each, and the winning adventure of the five gets to move onward and upward in the RPG writing industry. This review is a review of one of the adventures from the five finalists. I've reviewed each of the five final adventure submissions, culminating in me choosing my own personal winning entry for PATHMASTER. Each review has been concluded with a few comments on the adventure relative to the others, and some justification as to its position in the winning stakes. All five reviews have been posted at the same time, so if you're reading this, you can read the other 4 review entries as well. With that in mind, on with the review.

Twilight Falling is a Pathfinder RPG adventure for characters of levels 5 to 7. This 39 page pdf product was written by Michael Holland. The product is neatly and professionally presented, and the artwork, maps and general layout are all very good. I particularly liked the fact that the layout is colour-coded in parts, allowing you to quickly see which sections of the adventure you need for read-aloud text, combat details, etc. Layout backgrounds are quite dark, meaning that this product might not be suitable for home printing. Writing is good, with some vivid descriptions, and some good imagery, and I particularly liked the detailed adventure synopses and background information. These little things make running an adventure much easier than trying to pick up the gist of the adventure on the fly.

Twilight Falling is the zombie adventure of the PATHMASTER contest. In this adventure the PCs travel to the town of Crepus (an amalgamation of Creepy?) which is plagued by an outbreak of zombies. The town is in disarray, as is the ruling council, particularly as the undead are considered part of the honored dead, and many of them cannot therefore be destroyed. The PCs will need to assist the town guard in dealing with the plague zombies, find and agree a plan of action with the town leaders, and then discover the machinations responsible for unleashing this plague on the town. In doing so, they will come face to face with the strange political nature of the town and its allies, and deal with some of the unusual laws that this town holds. The adventure is based largely in the town of Crepus, although parts of the adventure take place in the surrounding areas of the town. By and large, though, this is a location-based adventure, where the PCs investigate the matter and finally deal with the culprits.

This adventure is a good romp through a zombie-invested town. The town itself is quite a unique place, governed by a unique council with odd laws. The players will have plenty of opportunity to deal with waves of zombies, but also plenty of roleplaying and investigation as they try to uncover any clue as to who or what is behind the zombie infestation. The adventure sets a good atmosphere and keeps the action going at a reasonable pace. The first part of the adventure is largely spent dealing with zombies while investigating, while the second part is devoted to tracking down the culprits and dealing with them. There are probably a few ethical dilemmas involved along the way as well, though it's not up to the PCs to deal with the exact nature of the town and its council.

The PCs will have a good number of varied encounters despite the zombie theme, and as mentioned, not all zombie encounters are aimed at destroying the critters. The adventures uses some good locations for the main encounters of the town, and there are plenty of interesting villains that reveal themselves as the background story unfolds. There is some sense of urgency about the business of the zombies, although I wish this could have been played out a little more. At times it feels like the town guard are on top of things and the PCs just help occasionally, whereas full-scale panic would've created a greater sense of urgency and made for a better atmosphere and memorable adventure. I really enjoyed the overall mixture of combat, investigation and roleplaying, as it balances these nicely without introducing a massive zombie-killing fest.

Overall, this is a good and compelling adventure, though moving along fairly standard lines of theme and organisation. The adventure maintains good atmosphere, and the pace is decent, though in both cases I think things could have been better. I liked the varied encounters and locations of the adventure, although a greater sense of panic would've been better than the somewhat complacent approach to the zombie plague. Very good adventure, with interesting town and background, and an unique location perhaps worth visiting again.

Twilight Falling is perhaps the adventure of the bunch that doesn't break as much ground as the others. Timeless Fort deals with time-travelling, Cutting Silver Pass with grand projects, for example, while Twilight Falling is perhaps too familiar in its theme of zombie plague. The action is good, and dynamic, though not in the same league as Timeless Fort or Ironwall Gap Must Hold. The aforementioned sense of critical timescales would've made this faster paced and more intense. It maintains very good atmosphere - not on par with To Walk the Dark Road, but better than the others with the themes of zombies, necromancy and all things dark and dangerous. Overall, I think this adventure takes elements that make the other adventures good and combines them to a lesser degree to create a good adventure but perhaps one that doesn't stand out too much. I think it presents the more interesting location of the bunch, where To Walk the Dark Road has the better wilderness encounters. In the end, a solid and entertaining adventure that I've rated as 4th in my list of adventures for the PATHMASTER contest.

The PATHMASTER products are part of an adventure writing and design competition from Adventureaweek.com. Five finalists from loads of initial entries were chosen to write an adventure each, and the winning adventure of the five gets to move onward and upward in the RPG writing industry. This review is a review of one of the adventures from the five finalists. I've reviewed each of the five final adventure submissions, culminating in me choosing my own personal winning entry for PATHMASTER. Each review has been concluded with a few comments on the adventure relative to the others, and some justification as to its position in the winning stakes. All five reviews have been posted at the same time, so if you're reading this, you can read the other 4 review entries as well. With that in mind, on with the review.

Cutting Silver Pass, written by Scott Janke, is Pathfinder RPG adventure for 7th level characters. This 37 page pdf has a neat and professional layout, with excellent art, maps and general presentation. The pdf uses colour coding to good effect, allowing one to differentiate between different elements of the adventure on a quick glance. Like others in the series, the backgrounds are heavy in colour, so this is not a particularly print-friendly product for home printing. Writing is good, though the clarity of the adventure outline is a bit lacking in places, and it's often not quite clear where the adventure is going or what the expected course of action is in a particular scenario.

This adventure takes place in the remote regions of the land in a rich mining colony run by several influential and important silver barons. Traditionally, silver mined in the area is carted around the mountain to more civilized areas, but a recent discovery by the local mining wizard has indicated that there is a path through the mountains that would substantially improve on mining operations. The PCs get involved when the mining wizard disappears with his secret plans for the new mountain pass/underpass and the silver barons enlist their aid in finishing the wizard's project. This adventure takes place in a variety of different locations, from the mining town, to the underground areas of the adventure, and eventually on to the other side of the mountain and civilized lands. Parts of the adventure are event-based, but for the most part the PCs will be location based as they execute the plans to complete each stage of cutting the pass.

Cutting Silver Pass is a varied adventure that has a lot of different opportunities for players and their characters. The adventure starts with an investigation into the mining wizard's disappearance, followed by some trickery (and a lot of luck) in finding the initial stages of the pass. There the PCs will have to overcome obstacles and clear dangers as the mining folk build the pass from the wizard's plans. The encounters are varied, particularly those that directly involve the PCs. There are a number of event based encounters that affect the mining operations themselves, slowing down progress or enabling the PCs to speed things up. There's plenty of opportunity for roleplaying, particularly in negotiation, where the PCs need to negotiate moving the pass through the lands occupied by others.

This is not an adventure that takes a few days of game time, but rather something that will involve the PCs for months. While these long timescales can quickly be glossed over, parts of the adventure really involve the PCs acting like project managers rather than adventurers. This might be fine for some, but I think the large time scales and the involvement of the mining projects actually hinder the smooth progress of the adventure. Essentially it boils down to the PCs overcoming some obstacles on a stage of the plan, and then having to wait weeks to complete the part until the next obstacles come around. These weeks are filled with events that hinder building progress, which don't always involve the PCs. The parts of the adventure that involve the PCs are good, particularly the negotiations on the other side of the mountain and the white-water rafting challenge, but the building operations are something I'd definitely skim over as it's just not that exciting.

Overall this is a good adventure. There're lots of interesting combat encounters, good roleplaying encounters, and a number of other scenarios that players and PCs will find enjoyable to indulge in. I think the long timescales are not for me, and it's a pity parts of the adventure were geared towards it rather than just keeping the building operations in the background. Still, lots of fun to be had in this good adventure.

As far as the other adventures in the contest are concerned, I think Cutting Silver Pass offers a unique experience in getting involved in a grand project, but the execution might not be for some. There's a lot of downtime that can be glossed over, but in doing so the movement from one part of the building plan to another seems forced. This slows down the pace and action of the game, and makes it feel a bit like a trawl. It's still a good adventure, though, but I think the dynamic approach of Timeless Fort and Ironwall Gap Must Hold is much more exciting, while the atmosphere of To Walk the Dark Road makes it much more fun to play through. Twilight Falling is also quite fast paced, even though it shares elements of investigative work with this adventure. Cutting Silver Pass is certainly different and explores the boundaries in adventure design by offering a unique experience that most PCs will not frequently get involved in. Still, I just don't think it holds up as well on the excitement and fast-paced action scales as the other adventures, and, as such, despite it's good offering, I've rated this adventure as 5th on my list of adventures in the PATHMASTER contest.

One Night Stand - Curse of Shadowhold is a Pathfinder RPG adventure for 10th level characters. In this adventure the PCs are requested to assist an elven village in breaking an ancient curse that holds sway in the forest surrounding their village. In doing so, the PCs get to uncover an even more sinister secret, that will change the lives of the elves forever. This very neatly presented adventure is set in a generic frontier wilderness, and should be adaptable to any campaign setting.

Frog God Games have long been one of my favourite adventure publishers, and the reasons are quite simple - they present professional products, with excellent attention to detail, and good background stories with solid adventure material. If there's a sidetrek that the PCs can go on, it's mentioned, for example, or if there is a contingency in the adventure that can come about, they provide advice on how to deal with it. Sometimes this comes across as forcing the PCs on a given path, but the illusion of flexibility can be quite powerful for the players.

Curse of the Shadowhold is a good, strong adventure. The players get involved in danger and terror right from the start, and get a good opportunity to explore wondrous locations in the Haunted Forest, even so much as to cross the veils between planes. There is quite a haunting element to the game, and GMs can easily turn this into quite a terrifying affair that's not for the faint hearted; wandering through a haunted forest, fighting shadow creatures from other planes, and being witness to secrets unfolding that are quite terrifying.

The adventure is quite a challenge, both from a combat perspective and a roleplaying one, where NPCs have their own agendas and plans on how to deal with matters. PCs will need to keep their wits about them, as they uncover secrets only to find the unexpected. It's not the most dynamic adventure in the world, with a rather stationary dungeon crawl, but the terror elements can liven that up if PCs don't know what to expect.

Overall, this is as good an adventure as one would expect from Frog God Games. Solid story, elements of terror, good dungeon crawl, strong combat encounters, and realistic NPCs. Throw in a few secrets to uncover, and you have one good night's game play.

The Clockwork Wonders of Brandlehill is a quaint little adventure for 4th level PCs of the Pathfinder RPG. In this adventure the characters get summoned to a little gnomish town full of clockwork machinations, and get embroidered in an adventure that involves the gnomes and the local tribes of the nearby swamps. The adventure is a humorous affair full of elements of comic fantasy, and is a good little romp with good roleplaying, plenty of combat, and a nice little story.

At first glance, The Clockwork Wonders of Brandlehill is a neatly presented product. The maps are good, the artwork is good and the general appearance of the product is good. Where the product is on the weaker side, is the organisation. There's very little delineation of different elements of the adventure, it's hard to distinguish between read-aloud text and GMs only text, the combat encounters can pass you by entirely as they're not clearly presented and the whole adventure just requires more organisation. A solid organisation goes a long way in making the adventure easier to run and understand, and the masses of fluff text here often hide mechanical details between them that make this adventure hard to digest. Section headings, clear indications of combat and the monsters involved (including stat blocks), an adventure summary and other such smaller touches would go a long way to making this easier for the GM.

That gripe aside, this is quite a fun little adventure. The characters get the opportunity to visit an ingenious gnomish town and explore the nearby swamps while they uncover the mystery of the what plagues the village. I wish the village descriptions had been more vivid, painting a better picture of all the machinations in the village, but one gets a fair overview of the village from the existing text. Roleplaying is rife, and the characters get a chance to engage in some meaningful encounters. The adventure starts off with a bang, which is always a good way to get the PCs dragged into the plot. How they approach the adventure and the diplomacy with the local swamp tribes is up to them, but here I wish the adventure had provided some helpful guides and perhaps some alternatives to existing choices which can be fairly linear. I think the adventures caters for most areas of gameplay, and players of all types will have some good fun. With gnomes and gripply abounding, it's bound to be a fun adventure, and GMs can have a lot of fun with some of the comical elements. Roleplaying gnomes can always be adventurous.

Overall, the adventure side of things is exciting and keeps the pace going, despite a few flaws in adventure linearity and lack of guidance in certain areas. The organisation is not strong, and GMs will have to sift through the fluff and mechanical text to put together a better organised whole and separate the adventure into meaningful sections. The clockwork wonders and new magical items are all quite interesting, though as mentioned, it would've been good to see some ingenuity on the grander scale of the village itself. A good little romp, despite its flaws, and should be fun for players and GMs alike.

Peter, Thank you for your review! The reception in terms of subject content has been consistently positive and makes me confident you'll find more to enjoy in our updated version (which is now perilously close to release!), especially in terms of organization, formatting and story structure (which includes details on alternative quest solutions as well). There was no lack of trepidation when we released our first publication but I'm sure that our second time at bat with The Clockwork Wonders of Brandlehill will definitely earn us a few more runs, as it were. Keep any eye out for TCWoB 1.5, and thank you again for your feedback!

The Stealer of Children is a Labyrinth Lord adventure for 1st level characters. The product is neatly presented, with good art and maps, and the writing is clear with excellent attention to detail. This adventure takes place in the small town of Leandras Row and its environs, a setting that can easily be placed in any area of a homebrew campaign setting. This is largely a freeform adventure, with characters making their own decisions, so may not be suitable for groups that need a lot of nudging to get them to head in the right direction.

In this adventure the players arrive in Leandras Row, where they are immediately confronted by a challenge that sets the scene for the remainder of the adventure. Something mysterious is afoot in the town, and it's up to the PCs to discover what's afoot. While investigating, they get to engage with numerous well-crafted and interesting NPCs and factions, and that is one of this adventure's strengths. The NPCs are detailed, the town is detailed, and there's lots of opportunity for good and interesting roleplaying. The characters will have to work to solve the mystery. Of course, while investigating matters take a turn for the worse as the Stealer of Children strikes again, and with missing kids on the menu, things start to get serious. The PCs need to delve into an ancient past to discover the truth of matters, and offer some chance of redemption for a family spurned. Then, they'll need to find a solution to finding the Stealer of Children and destroying a creature that mere 1st level mortals should not be able to harm.

I've always enjoyed Small Niche Games' adventures for Labyrinth Lord, and this one is no exception. It's a lovely and detailed freeform adventure, where the characters aren't forced to take certain paths on how to approach the mystery and the adventure. The story is interesting and has a good back-story, and it should be a good romp for the characters in solving it. This is very much a roleplaying heavy adventure - combat encounters are few and far between and even the fixed combat locations/dungeons don't offer much in terms of continuous challenge. LLs might want to use random encounters in the environs to challenge the PCs in this area a little further.

The adventure itself can actually be quite short, and without long combat encounters, the roleplaying can be handled fairly quickly. The PCs need to be proactive, though, otherwise the players might get bored if they're not getting much in the way of information and it can easily feel like you're not getting anywhere. Some encouragement might be needed here and there. I think the final solution to the adventure is quite clever, and I think the players will enjoy it once they've discovered the culprit and managed to find out how to deal with it. If this adventure is treated as a sandbox in some regards, these issues can easily be addressed, and creative LLs will make this and enjoyable adventure.

Overall, I think this is a good adventure. I love the detail behind the NPCs and the town, the premise is interesting, and the freeform nature of the adventure makes for an interesting change of pace from the linear style of many adventures. The combat is a bit lacking in several areas, but that can be addressed while investigating the town environs. Proactive characters will find there's plenty on offer here, and will enjoy piecing together the pieces of the puzzle, while LLs might need to encourage other groups to ask the right questions and investigate the right areas. A good introductory adventure for characters, particularly from a roleplaying point of view.

The first instalments of the 100% Crunch series for the Pathfinder RPG focused on presenting statistics and combat details based on an individual template. This product, 100% Crunch - Goblins, takes another path, and instead offers statistics focused on a single creature type - goblins. And, I'm very pleased to say that it works very well. This product presents an eclectic and interesting group of goblin creatures, with excellent builds and lots of flavour built into each design through carefully crafted mechanics.

100% Crunch - Goblins presents nearly 50 goblins in a CR range from 1/4 to 5. The CR range is kept deliberately low, and I have to agree with the notion that CR 10 or higher goblins don't really need to feature in a game with enough higher level challenges. The goblins cover a wonderful range of classes and abilities, both NPC and PC classes, and each one is crafted with good attention to detail. Even when the classes are similar, the choice of weapons, armor or the use of class archetypes personifies each goblin uniquely. On this front, the product has done excellent well.

I think this product has been done splendidly. I've always been a fan of the Pathfinder goblin, and this product stays true to the concept and provides some wonderful combinations. Each goblin creature has its own 'title' from goblin scouts, to goblin shadow sorcerers, to the fearful goblin abomination. I love these little titles, as they're really useful when gaming. Instead of calling each goblin by a number, this nomenclature (if one could call it that) allow one to easily identify the different goblins on the battlefield.

If you're interesting in goblins and are looking for some excellent goblin builds, this product is well worth a look. I truly relished looking through each of the builds, and appreciating the care and attention that had gone into making each one different and true to the goblin concept. A great product, and one I would recommend.

Monster Focus: Skeletons is a short pdf for the Pathfinder RPG that presents a selection of skeleton-related options for both players and GMs. The product is neatly presented and well-written, and includes feats, spells, new alchemical items, new monster options and templates, and several new magical items. For those interested in expanding their options where the quintessential skeleton is concerned, this product offers a good way of doing that.

Skeletons are an excellent low-level undead creature to throw against your adventuring party. In part, this is because the skeleton template can be applied to just about any creature, so there's a lot of versatility in creating different kinds of skeletons. The human-like skeleton is no longer the only option, as dragon skeletons or bear skeletons, for example, can provide a different twist to the skeleton encounter. There's always been something creepy about skeletons, in particular when you imagine them clawing their way out of the ground to reach their living foes. And those who've watched the film Jason and the Argonauts will fondly remember the skeleton battle on the top of the cliffs.

This product is all about skeleton-related options. It presents options for players in the form of new feats, spells and alchemical items, and for GMs there are some new undead creations to play with. The player options are geared towards increasing damage against skeletons, be it from bypassing their damage reduction, or from spells that are more effective against skeleton-like creatures. New alchemical items are also presented that are very effective against skeletons. Each item is presented with good attention to detail, and solid mechanics.

For the GMs, there's the new skeleton lord template, a stronger skeleton capable of commanding and leading undead creatures. There are also some options to create a different variety of skeleton, including those that can retain some of their abilities from life. Fire breathing dragon skeletons, here we come! I think these GM option allow for a lot of good possibilities, and I particularly liked the plot hooks that were presented for the product as they seamlessly integrate some of the creatures and items presented in this pdf.

While I liked the options presented for GMs, I think the player options, while useful, aren't really that exciting. Designing something specific for a skeleton is fine when it's the only thing that can affect the creature, but there are plenty of other spells, for example, that can be just as effective against them. I've looked at the options for players, and there aren't many 'must have' options there - mostly just those that looks interesting but might not see a lot of game play value.

Overall, I think this is a stimulating product, particularly for GMs, but players in undead centered campaigns may want to peruse this product for some interesting options and items. Good product, with good value, and good variety.

Ruster's Blood is a 54 page pdf adventure for the Pathfinder RPG suitable for characters of 4th level. The adventure is entirely location-based, meaning it can easily slot into any specific campaign setting. The product is neatly presented and well organised, with some excellent and detailed maps. The product is strangely devoid of any art, and even the cover doesn't feature anything specific. Nevertheless, the overall impression is one of professionalism and dedication to delivering a good product.

In this adventure the characters are approached by a miner who enlists their aid in assisting him rescue his co-workers and recover his mine, after it was attacked by some unknown assailants. The adventure takes place in the mine itself and the region directly surrounding the mind, and will take the characters on a wild ride through the mine and into it's deepest and darkest depths. The characters will face multiple threats once they reach the mine, not only from the those involved in the initial attack, but also from new inhabitants that have since claimed the mine as their own. The characters will need all their wits about them if they're to break into the mine, vanquish the initial foes, and then plumb the depths of the mine to get to the bottom of the who the mysterious attackers are.

I found this to be a fun adventure, with plenty of opportunity for tactics, strategy and roleplaying. This isn't an adventure for the faint-hearted, as the combat encounters can be quite tough and often deadly. In a way that's one of my few complaints against this product - due to the difficulty of some of the foes, the party will experience a case of fighting one battle, retreating for the day, and then repeating the same thing the next day. I would've preferred to see a more dynamic approach, particularly on the deeper foes of the mine. I think the initial breaking into the mine should be a fun challenge, although I would imagine that some parties would find it frustrating. The adventure itself could've done better to cater for different eventualities, again more specifically with reference to the final foes of the adventure. Here it could've explored peaceful solutions, or alternative offerings as a way of concluding the adventure.

I thoroughly enjoyed the creatures and characters of this adventure, and I think they make an interesting and eclectic challenge. I would've liked to see more motivations and personality here and there, but by and large there's a lot to go on. This adventure has a lot of potential, and creative DMs can develop it further or expand the adventure with tie-ins to future adventures. The location of the mine is well detailed and interesting, and is realistically presented with some good attention to detail of mining terrain, activity and difficulties.

Overall, I think this is a strong adventure. Characters will have some fun, particularly if the DM can develop the action a little more dynamically than the adventure currently explores. It would've been nice to see more attention to roleplaying as a solution to certain scenarios, and perhaps negotiation as a means of solving problems. Still, it's a well presented product with good attention to detail, strong writing, challenging encounters and lots of interesting new creatures and magic. Good adventure.

A3 Champion's Rest is the third adventure in the A-series of adventures from Adventureaweek.com. This adventure follows on from A1 Crypt of the Sun Lord and A2 Devil of Dark Wood, although it can easily be played as a standalone adventure. The adventure forms part of Adventureaweek.com's campaign setting, but again the locations are easily transferable to other settings. Champion's Rest is a Pathfinder RPG adventure for characters of levels 2 to 3.

Champion's Rest takes place on the Rybalkan Peninsula, an outcropping of land in the vast Serpent Lake. In the adventure, Crypt of the Sun Lord, the adventurers are sent towards the frontier peninsula, an area once occupied by the barbarian hordes of the Vikmordere. On arrival they become entangled in the affairs of several goblins occupying a nearby crypt. In Devil of the Dark Wood, the adventurers finally reach the village of Rybalka, a frontier village, only to find that there is talk of beasts in the air. The characters must uncover the mystery that stalks the village, and so destroy an evil that has been plaguing the dark wood and surroundings.

In this adventure, more trouble is afoot in the village of Rybalka, as the Vikmordere have been spotted in the area near an ancient burial ground, and the soldiers sent to confront them have disappeared. The adventure takes place en-route towards and in the ancient Vikmordere burial ground where the soldiers were last headed. The characters are hired to find out what happened to the missing soldiers, but more is afoot than meets the eye. The characters investigate the ancient burial chambers in an effort to solve the mystery, but of course the Vikmordere quickly get involved and tensions escalate. All in all this makes for an enjoyable adventure.

The adventure has a good mix of tension, combat and mystery, although contrary to the adventure blurb which mentions engaging with the Vikmordere in some form of alliance, there's not a lot of opportunity for roleplaying with the Vikmordere in this adventure. I found that a little disappointing, as I was expecting the adventure to cater for this, but sadly it didn't. Nevertheless. the burial ground as a location-based scenario is fairy good, with traps, challenges and mysteries to be solved. The characters will be tested to their limits in some of the combat encounters, and at least the journey to the burial ground through the dangerous Dark Wood allows for some good roleplaying opportunity.

I think this adventure is strong in its challenges and in getting the characters to be creative in facing threats and solving puzzles, but perhaps a bit lacking in roleplaying, where I though the characters would get an opportunity to engage first-hand with the Vikmordere and get to know this people a little bit more. Still, one should find this enjoyable, with some detailed locations and good encounter design and presentation. The adventure was surprisingly low on the treasure front, particularly in the reward areas for completing the adventure. My hope, though, is that once one learns more about the Vikmordere people this adventure can be modified to be a bit more engaging on that front. Good adventure.

Toys for the Sandbox 58 - The Mouth of Moonshield Canyon is a well-presented pdf providing adventure ideas and descriptions for the canyon and its environs. I've long wanted to review one of Occult Moon's Toys for the Sandbox products, and I'm kind of disappointed that I didn't sooner because, judging by this product, I've been missing out. The Mouth of Moonshield Canyon is ripe with ideas for the picking, very well delivered with exactly the right amount of detail, and good at inspiring the imagination. An all-round fabulous product.

The Mouth of Moonshield Canyon is an unique location - living stones formed from residual magic guard the canyon entrance as part of their holy ground, while being watchful over barbarian threats and intruders from nearby locations. The product provides a gripping background, history and description to the location (including an illustrative map), numerous NPC personalities that one may encounter in the area, and excellent adventure ideas and possibilities for short or long excursions to the location. I thoroughly enjoyed reading each part of this pdf, as it really inspired one to adventure! The diversity of adventure ideas tied to one location is impressive, and it would easily suit most adventure character levels and party types. The product does a wonderful job of catering towards a wide variety of different stories and adventures that can be had.

What I really liked about the product is that all the numerous adventure ideas can be played separately, but as they're all tied to one location, can easily be combined into a larger whole. This means that you can make the adventure as complicated or as simple as you like, depending on how much time you have in your session. All you need to do is throw together the mechanics and various encounter details, as location descriptions, NPC personalities and motivations, and numerous plots and subplots (and variations of these!) have been provided.

If the rest of the Toys for the Sandbox series is as good as this, then they're all well worth the look. This is a great product that inspires the imagination, and its utility can vary depending on the GM's needs. Great writing, presentation, format, and wonderfully rich and creative. Excellent product.

Dragon-Dogs is a 24 page pdf product that presents 9 new breeds of dragon-dog - rare and valuable creatures formed from the union between dragons and different kinds of dog-like animals. The product is neatly presented with adequate artwork and flavourful descriptions of the various dragon-dogs. This product is suitable for the Pathfinder RPG.

Dragon-Dogs presents a good variety of different dragon-dogs, from the elven dragon-dogs bred from fairy dragons, to the necrotic dragon-dog, a sinister breed conjured by the mind of undead sorcerers, and the dragolf, a massive dragon-dog bred by giants from dragons and dire wolves. I enjoyed reading the descriptions of the origins of these various breeds, and some of the background history. There is some good material here, giving some useful flavour to each of the nine breeds presented. The product even includes some additional details on dragon-dog eggs and their resale value.

I couldn't help but feel,though, that there was something missing from this product. While the descriptions mention that these creatures are bred from dragons, they don't have very dragon-like characteristics other than in appearance (some have wings, for example, but can't use them). In other words, they take on more of the characteristics of the other base creature as opposed to that of a dragon. The terran dragon-dog has tremorsense, for example, while dragerine (dire wolverine) have a greater rage ability. Maybe I was expecting something a little more dragon-like, but then one would've thought that the half-dragon template would be more than sufficient for that. One has to assume that the aim was to not give them dragon-like characteristics (i.e. half-dragon) but rather just make bigger dogs with characteristics of other animal/creature breed. Still, I'm wondering whether a template wouldn't have been a better idea here, as most of these creatures do seem to be based on other creatures combined into a canine form.

I think this is a decent product, but the mechanical implementation left something to be desired, and the concept is perhaps not strongly supported in mechanics through the flavour text. There seems to be little connection between the two. I think these are useful creatures, but I'm not sure I would call them dragon-dogs, as opposed to larger dogs more akin to magical beasts. These creature are good alternatives to some standard creatures, and I can certainly see these used in campaigns as animal companions or other allies in adventures. Decent product.

100% Crunch is a series of products designed to provide GMs with ready made stat-blocks and creatures for ease of use during a Pathfinder RPG game. This installment focuses on the skeletal champion template, a more intelligent undead skeleton that is capable of holding class levels. The product is neatly presented and is available with both screen- and print-friendly versions.

The standard skeleton is one of the quintessential undead creatures in any fantasy RPG. In the Pathfinder RPG the skeleton is taken one step further by creating a more powerful template-based creature, the skeletal champion. This more intelligent undead creature is stronger, smarter and deadlier, but more importantly, more versatile as it can hold class levels. In this way it covers quite a prolific area for undead critters - mage skeletons, warrior skeletons and powerful cleric skeletons - all staples of everyday fantasy.

This product presents dozens of ready-made skeletal champions in a range of challenge ratings, from CR 2 to CR 11. The variety of creatures is good, including most of the generic humanoid creatures such as dwarves, humans and kobolds, but also some more diverse creatures such as hags and dragons. I think the product is more heavily focused on humanoids, though, which is perhaps a slight weakness. Class types are well represented as well, although it might have been worth including different base creatures as opposed to yet another orc barbarian of higher level.

The product includes a useful variety of alternative skeletal champions, such as acid skeletons or exploding skeletons, and I particularly liked the kobold exploding skeletal champion as a concept. The author has clearly put thought into every combination. Because the product also includes all the base rules for creating skeletal champions, it turns the product into a one-stop location for all your skeletal champion needs. The ready-made stat-blocks can easily be expanded to include more levels, different class levels to more basic creatures, and so on. I am happy with the potential for variety included in this product - it's not only something that can be used as is, but also as a sandbox for further development of interesting creature combinations.

I'd say this product is a good hit. Good variety, good combinations, good potential, and good attention to getting stat-blocks as accurate as possible. If you're interested in a variety of challenging and different skeleton-like creatures, this is worth a look. Good product.

Thanks for your review, Peter. I much appreciate it and I'm glad you enjoyed 100% Crunch Skeletal Champions. Out of interest, what would make this a five-star product (I'd like to make subsequent offerings better!)